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Report of the Librarian 40 American Antiquarian Society. [Oct., REPORT OF THE LIBRARIAN. In this, my first annual report to the Society, I had intended to describe some of the special collections of the library and to trace the growth of the collection from its establish- ment in 1812 to the present day. But since these matters are fully treated in the Handbook of Information regarding the Society, to be soon distributed, this report will be con- fined to a relation of the progress of the year. The guiding spirit in the acquirement of additions to the library has been that of specialization. To strengthen those departments of the library which are already strong, to obtain material for which the Society is a proper óustodian and to reject that which does not come within our scope— are all parts of this program. Two years ago, several members of the Society, prom- inent in library matters, were requested by the President to give a formal expression of their opinion as to the proper scope of the library of the Antiquarian Society and the lines of its future development. Among the reports then submitted, that written by Mr. George Parker Winship was so comprehensive and convincing and expresses so clearly my own views regarding the library, that I herewith repro- duce it as part of my report. Under date of October 30, 1907, Mr. Winship writes:— "Without a clear understanding of what the function of the American Antiquarian Society is, it will be impossible to decide definitely regarding the proper development of the Society's library, a development which should include the elimination of books now useless and never likely to be used in this library. As it seems to me, the object of our Society, in its library, is to accumulate and preserve, accessible to all qualified students, everything that can be of assistance to those 1909.] Report of the Librarian. 41 who study the history of America. Inasmuch as the library is situated in Worcester, where there are other libraries which are devoted specifically to the accumulation of local Worcester material, and to meeting the needs of general readers interested in current modern historical publications, there is no need for the Society to collect in either of these lines. The Society ought to devote its resources to improving its collections in departments which other libraries in Worcester, or possibly elsewhere within a day's trip, have not developed more thoroughly than this library can expect to do. "The Society ought, first of all, to increase just as far as possible those departments in which it already has large and important collections, with the idea of making the collections in the American Antiquarian Society library pre-eminent above all competitors on certain clearly recognized subjects. "Taking into consideration the history of the Society and of its library, this is clearly a proper place for large groups of books, many of which President Eliot has dubbed "dead books," which are almost never used by anyone—but which, when called for, are in most cases wanted by students of excep- tional erudition, engaged in researches of real consequence into the regions beyond the limits of the usual academic range. It is peculiarly the province of an Antiquarian Society to be prepared to assist in the work of scholars of this character. The Society ought, therefore, to retain so far as it can do so its reputation in the public mind as a dumping ground, if you will, of all the old trash of garrets and dead clergymen's effects. The expense of handling and sorting out such material is great, greater than most libraries are willing to assume on account of the small yield of books immediately useful; which is just why this Society should welcome it as a part of its duty, recog- nizing that the ultimate yield to its own resources and to scholarship much more than justifies the cost. Whenever possible, such gifts should be accepted with the clear under- standing that the Society is to act as a clearing-house, retaining the privilege of disposing not only of duplicates but of any books which would obviously be more useful somewhere else. "It is especially true in a library such as this that the contents. or subject matter of a book as often as not constitute its least interesting aspect. The number of American publications, large and small, which it is inconceivable that anyone should ever wish to read, is very large. Most of these are, nevertheless, on account of the place where, or the person by whom printed, or from some peculiarity of the printing, likely to be of great value to future students of American printing. The debt of the Society to the first historian of printing in America- Isaiah Thomas—makes it especially desirable that in this 42 American Antiquarian Sodety. [Oct., Society's library should be found the material for those who will, from time to time, rewrite that history, in whole or in parts. "Closely allied to this subject is that of the art and craft of book-binding, and the library contains many invaluable exam- ples of American bindings, oftentimes on books which are not otherwise important. Some of these earlier bindings are stiffened with sheets of other books, and these will in time need to be examined carefully in the hope of finding in them parts of some of the thousands of colonial publications which have apparently entirely disappeared. "There is another large group of books which are interesting because of the marks of ownership which they contain. Besides these "Association books" which restore a sort of personal touch with the worthies or unworthies of other days, there are those which, because they go to show us what was virtually the entire library of some long ago forgotten clergyman, doctor or man of affairs, are of the utmost value as an exemplification of just what made up the intellectual stock in trade of typical characters in other .generations. The books which contain the autograph of "Crescentius Matherus," now scattered over the building, are a striking illustration, but other libraries received in block are not less important, because they are more truly illustrative of a larger intellectual stratum. "In fulfilling its duties to such varied possible interests of future students the Society will, perforce, find itself in posses- sion of long shelves full of. volumes seemingly worthless. It must not be forgotten, however, that the most worthless books usually have a story to tell to those who have stumbled upon the particular key to open the mystery. Various successive editions of theological treatises seem useless enough, and yet there is nothing that so convincingly reveals the amazing ability of colonial New Englanders to digest theological sub- tleties as the shelves full of these volumes, which would never have been printed if there had not been money to be made by selling them—except where this deduction is controverted by the equally interesting fact, which could only have been discovered by comparing the actual volumes side by side, that successive editions are evidence of the fact that the .books did not sell, and that the printer tried to get his money back by inserting an up-to-date title-page in front of the old sheets of text. "If I seem to have argued against disposing of most of the books now in the library, it is because my own experience has led me to feel more and more certain that there is lio possible way of guessing what unheard of thing the next person who comes into the library will want, if the library is one with a 1909.] Report of the Librarian. 43 reputation, such as ï believe the American ^tiquarian Society should strive to acquire, for possessing unheard-of resources. "The books which the Society's library does not need are primarily those which are to be had elsewhere. Any book, and certainly a book not related to at least a shelf full of other books, which can be gotten in half an hour or, thanks to the telephone, in half a day, is not, other things being equal, worth the space which it would fill on the library shelves. There are certain large classes, which no one, not intimately familiar with the library, would expect to find in an Antiquarian Society library^. European literature, unless like Rabelais and Chat- eaubriand it shows how America infiuenced Europe; English county history, not of American genealogical interest; the biographies of Europeans who had no known infiuence upon American events, should properly be looked for in a public library, where will also be preserved most of the publications of recent years, including periodicals, which have enjoyed any popular vogue. The Society might properly preserve any books, perhaps even novels, that no one ever heard of, but why it should fill its shelves with the things that are carefully kept in every library one-fiftieth its size, is not obvious. The Soci- ety's library ought not to be a library for readers, in my opinion. It should be a place for special investigators, however broad or minute their field of study, who will be familiar with all the special treatises on their particular subjects, and who are seeking an opportunity to examine, through the Society's foresight, those things which the public that patronizes most other libraries has no interest in. The Society's library should contain everything that it can possess itself of, that other libraries do not preserve. It should have this material so arranged and catalogued as to anticipate as far as possible the needs of investigators who visit or wTite to the library.
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